Winter Wonderland
by Kristine
Summary: A friend returns. And wreaks havoc on the rest of the gang. A nutty little piece.


Winter Wonderland  
  
Premise: A friend returns. And wreaks havoc on the rest of the gang. A nutty little piece.  
  
Disclaimer: I don't own anything. And I wouldn't be Bright, Kaufman, or Crane if you paid me. (You'd have to know me to understand the dire significance of that sentence.)  
  
Author's note: This is an AU of sorts. All you have to pretend is that Ross and Rachel got together at the beginning of season 10, immediately following Joey and Rachel's breakup. (Not an altogether pleasant nor plausible thing to have happen, but necessary for the timing of the story.) And I feel that a note of apology in advance is necessary, as I have a downright crazy schedule. I hope to get this thing updated as soon as possible, but my motto at this time of year with respect to writing is "all in good time," meaning that I'm too insanely busy to update say, tomorrow. Please leave a review!  
  
One more note: What is supposed to be in italics is surrounded by an * instead.  
  
Let the games begin . . . .  
  
Prologue  
  
Christmas, 2006.  
  
The New York yellow taxi screeched to a halt, throwing its passenger forcefully back into the seat and sending the wet snow that lined the street flying though the crisp, dap air.  
  
"This it, mister?" the cabbie asked, turning around to face his passenger in the back seat, his gold tooth glinting in the light of a streetlamp.  
  
"Yep, this is it," Joey answered, looking up at the building and thrusting a few twenties into the cab driver's hand. The brick Greenwich Village apartment building looked merry in the darkness of early evening, yellow lights and the silhouettes of Christmas trees brightening most windows. He opened the car door, and a cold wind greeting him from the east. He struggled out of the cab with a small duffel bag in hand, almost forgetting to mutter a half-hearted "Merry Christmas" to the cab driver before he flew off once more down the block.  
  
Joey drew his coat more tightly around him, and stuffed his free hand into his pocket. He was here at last, the little corner of Bedford and Grove in the West Village. He was home. It was just as he remembered it. Snow made its way down from the sky slowly, like the flakes had escaped from someone's grasp, only to be lit up for a few brief seconds by the streetlamp before nestling into its place on the now white sidewalk. Couples and families wound their way down the streets, going to the apartments of friends and family. A group of ten year olds were finishing up a snowball fight in the crooked street, making the occasional taxi cab drive around them, their faces bright, their cheeks red, their mittened hands full of snow, screams of glee puncturing the air in bursts, the occasional white arc flying at top speed for someone's head. Joey chuckled to himself, remembering the carefree easiness that pervaded this neighborhood.  
  
Pulling his gaze away, he looked back up to the apartment building in front of him, the familiarity of it nearly taking his breath away. It had only been a year and half, but somehow it seemed longer.  
  
Telling them had been the hardest part.  
  
Flashback: June, 2004.  
  
"You're - you're what?" It was Phoebe who spoke first, breaking the stunned silence in apartment 20. None of the five on the couch looked at each other, their eyes intent on Joey. Joey saw Chandler's hand find Monica's, and Ross' found Rachel's, squeezing tight, the sparkling platinum engagement band cutting into her flesh.  
  
"Okay, okay, so you're just taking off? Leaving? Just like that?" Phoebe continued. For once her voice had none of its halting trademark sarcasm, and Joey's heart gave an almightily twinge. *He was breaking up the group. He was the one to do it.*  
  
"Well, when are you leaving?" asked Ross.  
  
The question hung in the air, heavy under the slippery humidity of early summer. Joey took a deep breath. "Tomorrow," he let out. "I leave tomorrow night. Redeye."  
  
"Oh my god. Joey, tomorrow? But that's . . . that's . . . y'know, that's *tomorrow*!" exclaimed Monica, jumping up and knocking over a vase on the end table that toppled to the hardwood floor and smashed instantly on contact. Its shards scattered restlessly across the floor, spinning, skidding, and rattling on a thousand tiny axes, seeming to concretize the weight of Joey's statement. Monica did not bend to clean them, but merely closed her eyes and forced herself to continue, "Not important. Joey, hon, have you even started pack-" But she was cut off with a crushing sob from Rachel, and Joey looked on helplessly as she launched herself from her place on the couch and bolted for the apartment door, her heels clicking unsteadily across the floor, every other step crushing the vase's shattered glass. The door opened and closed with a bang, and his chest tightened painfully.  
  
"You guys, I'm sorry," said Joey, his voice heavy and his breath measured. "I feel awful. It - It won't be forever." He gave a short laugh, "Knowing me, I'll screw up and be home in two and a half weeks." Out of the corner of his eye he could see Monica's lips part in the tiniest of grins, only to be lost again as her mouth pulled itself into its original serious line.  
  
"No you won't, Joe" Chandler said quietly. "You'll be perfect." And suddenly he had risen from the couch to give him a bear hug, the other three clamoring to join in, crushing Joey with their arms tight around his shoulders, back, and neck, words of encouragement blossoming from their lips and sinking into grateful ears.  
  
But Joey was aware of the absence of one. "Thanks, you guys," he said, his words barely audible, muffled as they were by Ross' t-shirt. "I - I gotta go to Rachel." He ducked from underneath Ross's arm and headed for the door, tears threatening to spill, his breath coming in ragged gulps, leaving the other four dumbfounded.  
  
Monica went to the cupboard and pulled out a broom and dustpan.  
  
Joey reached for the door handle of apartment 19, fingers wrapping shakily around it, overly aware of the coldness of the metal beneath them. He turned the handle and pulled, revealing the apartment that he had spent the better part of twelve years in. And no, he hadn't started packing yet. The phone sat on the counter, still connected. The pillows on the couch sat in their original, haphazard, places. Videos stood on the shelf, stubbornly refusing to be packed. Magazines, newspapers, and scripts lay on the coffee table, defiant in their scatterdness.  
  
Rachel was nowhere to be seen.  
  
"Rachel?" Joey called tentatively. "Rach, you here?"  
  
*Thwack!*  
  
Joey's eyes sprang in the direction of his bedroom, the source of the noise. His feet followed, tiptoeing towards the bedroom. "Uh, Rach, is that you? Look, I am so-" *Thwack!* "-sorry about-Rach, what're you doing?" Rachel zipped past him, a messy stack of once-folded shirts in hand. *Thwack!* The shirts were thrown mercilessly into a half-full suitcase perched on Joey's bed.  
  
"Me?" said Rachel, with scaldingly mocking innocence dripping from her eyes. She brush past him again, heading for the closet. "Oh, nothing. Nothing at all. I just thought you'd need help *packing,*" the anger finally escaping on the last word. Her hands plunged into the closet, emerging with another handful of shirts.  
  
"Rachel, please don't do this."  
  
"Don't do *what*?" She stopped, her blazing blue eyes meeting his pleading brown ones, her bottom lip trembling. She took a step closer to him. "What would you rather me do, huh? Tell me, Joey, and I'll do it," she said, clutching the shirts to her chest.  
  
"Rachel, stop," he moaned, unable to bear it all. *Why had he taken this job again?*  
  
Rachel blinked, tears finally springing our of her eyes. She closed the gap between them completely. "Stop what, Joey? Stop caring that you're leaving? Stop wanting you to stay? Stop being upset?" *Stop loving you?*  
  
He faltered. It had been too long since she was this close to him, and he could feel her breath hot on his neck. He fought down a shiver.  
  
And before he could register what was happening, he felt Rachel's lips on his in a hungry kiss. The shirts fell to the ground with a soft *thwump,* landing on top of their feet, and in a heartbeat her hands were in his hair.  
  
Heat swelled through Joey's body, and he let out a careless moan into Rachel's mouth as she slipped her tongue between his already parted lips. For the moment, he didn't care that she was engaged, that this was wrong, or that he was leaving tomorrow. For the moment, the almost forgotten pleasure of the warm weight of Rachel's body against his, her hands under his shirt, massaging his sides in slow, even circles was enough to block out even the most coherent of thoughts. Finally, one caught on. *This was Rachel. Ross's Rachel. Crap.*  
  
Joey sprang back, grabbing Rachel's hands as they snuck lower, moving towards his waist. "Rach, wait, wait, wait." He could hardly get the words out his breath was so ragged. Rachel let herself lean forward onto the balls of her feel, ready to give in whenever Joey did. He kept her wrists tight. "What the hell was that? One minute, you're madder than all get out, and now you're kissing me?"  
  
Rachel took a deep breath, and leveled her eyes to look straight into Joey's. "If you had me, would you go?"  
  
He blinked, seemingly uncomprehending. "What?"  
  
"Answer it, Joe. If we had made it, if we were together, if you *had* me, would you go to L.A.?"  
  
Joey loosened his grip on her, and she let her hands fall to droop at her sides, drained of energy.  
  
"What would be the better answer?" he whispered, plopping down onto the bed and pulling Rachel to sit down beside him, their legs and shoulders meeting.  
  
"Honestly? I don't know." She bit her lip.  
  
He reached for her hand, trembling, his fingers finding her ring. "Then it doesn't matter. All that matters, is this." He tapped her ring finger, and brought her hand up to his mouth to kiss her palm. "You're with Ross now, Rach. And *we* didn't make it."  
  
The two sat in silence.  
  
"You know something, Joey?" said Rachel. He turned to her, taking in her smooth face, her blue eyes, her scent. She smelled like tears. "I'm always going to wonder if that was the right thing."  
  
And with that, she leaned forward, catching his lips with hers in a fleeting kiss before standing and exiting the room, closing the door to apartment 19 with a soft click, leaving Joey alone with his thoughts.  
  
End of flashback.  
  
Before Joey knew it, his feet were taking him through the door beside Central Perk and up the stairs to apartment 20, hand ready to knock on the door of his former life.  
  
~*~*~*~  
  
"Does anyone want more pumpkin pie?" said Monica from the couch, struggling to disentangle herself from an especially stubborn Christmas ribbon that seemed to have attached itself to her ankle. "Or apple! I think there's still some apple left. Or how about the rice pudding? There's a bunch of that, too - Oh, *come on*!" she took a hold of the offending ribbon with a death grip and yanked, finally freeing her ankle, although surfacing with a somewhat harassed look on her face. She pursed her lips together, like she felt like chastising the red length of curled Christmas packaging but couldn't quite bring herself to criticize anything having to do with Christmas out loud. Chandler shot her a look of restrained amusement.  
  
"Think you made enough desserts there, Mon? We could have done with some cherry pie, too," he said from the armchair, holding his empty plate for her to refill. Under her half-pleased, half-don't-start-with-me-Bing stare, he managed a quiet, "But cherries stain, so why would I want to eat those things? Especially in the living room. Yugh! Pumpkin, please."  
  
Monica indulged him with a quick smile, took his plate with the grace of a perfect hostess, and picked her way across the mine field of wrapping paper, careful to avoid any ribbon that might be contemplating booby- trapping either one of her ankles. Chandler turned to Rachel, smile fighting to escape onto his lips, "Hey, it could have been worse. At least I didn't ask for figgie pudding. She *actually* might have bitten my head off." Rachel giggled.  
  
"Anyone else? Pheebs? Rach? Mike? I really did make too much," Monica called from the kitchen, not at all looking like she had meant to make one ounce less.  
  
"I'll take rice pudding," said Ross, emerging from Monica's bedroom where he had been checking on a sleeping Emma. Rachel watched him as he sat down into Monica's former spot on the couch, wondering what exactly it was about his tall and agile form that made her heart half melt at the same time that it made her skin want to crawl. He turned to her, eyes an adoring puppy dog brown. "You want anything, sweetie?"  
  
Fighting down the smallest of winces, she sighed, placing a hand on her full stomach. She had a feeling Monica's Christmas dinner was on its merry way to her thighs already. "No, but I will take some more egg nog," she said, getting up and making her way to the kitchen, mug in hand.  
  
"Ooh! Ooh! I'll have some pumpkin, Mon!" called Phoebe from beside the stereo. She hit play, and suddenly Big Crosby's voice gave way to Ella Fitzgerald's. "I think we needed some Ella," said Phoebe, smiling and resuming her place on the couch.  
  
"Okay," said Monica from the kitchen, "So that's one rice pudding and two pumpkin pies -"  
  
Knock, knock, knock, knock, knock.  
  
Five soft taps on the door cut her off mid-sentence, and the six friends looked around at each other, confused.  
  
"Who's not here?" asked Ross, glancing around at the gang, and Rachel surprised herself by stared daggers at his back. *Joey,* she thought. *Joey isn't here, you idiot.* She hadn't realized his absence weighed so heavy. Now that she thought about it, though, she would have given anything to see his solid Italian form on the other side of the apartment door. She bit her lip hard, waiting for someone to make a move.  
  
Monica shrugged, and crossed to open the door.  
  
Ella Fitzgerald's liquid voice rose steadily in the suddenly silent room, filling every perfectly decorated corner of apartment 20 with the words of "Winter Wonderland." Monica's Christmas tree twinkled in the corner, every branch laden with small yellow lights, red Christmas baubles, candy canes, and a few strategically placed Emma-made ornaments. Lights laced themselves along the balcony and around the windows, poinsettias potted in small red and green pots graced the coffee and end tables, and candles lent a glow to the apartment, rendering edges soft and the air warm. Snow fell in silent flakes, sliding slowly past the darkened window like especially stealthy eaves-droppers. It was the picture of urban holiday cheer.  
  
Apart from the fact that Ella Fitzgerald was the loudest voice in the room. Apart from the fact that Joey stood in the doorway, mouth curved into a furtive half-grin.  
  
Please leave a review! 


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